


Falling In Love Again

by Master_Of_Ceremonies



Category: Cabaret - Kander/Ebb
Genre: Everyone Is Gay, Gender neutral pronouns for the emcee, Herr Shultz owns a deli, Homophobia, Hurt/Comfort, I promise there is eventual comfort, Modern AU, Pain, everyone becoming closer through trauma, genderqueer emcee, tags to be added as I update, the emcee has Issues, the entire kit kat klub is a family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-27
Updated: 2018-05-27
Packaged: 2019-05-14 13:38:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,348
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14770640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Master_Of_Ceremonies/pseuds/Master_Of_Ceremonies
Summary: The Emcee is falling, falling.The boys and girls of the Kit Kat Klub learn to catch them.





	Falling In Love Again

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [when living starts to feel like dying](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12980007) by [thesemovingparts](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesemovingparts/pseuds/thesemovingparts). 



> ahhhHHHh I've had this in my google docs for months, I hope you guys enjoy it. Updates will be infrequent, but helped along by comments!!!
> 
> ALso, don't read if you get triggered by violence and the trauma it causes. there will be some Not Fun Things in here.

Normally on friday nights, Lulu would have been drunk off her ass.

Okay, maybe that was an exaggeration. Maybe she only spent half her fridays partying the night away at some club, head and heart fuzzy with alcohol and the thrill of dancing until the sun came up. But almost all of them were spent with her fellow performers at the Kit Kat Klub. Whether they were rehearsing a new number Em had dreamed up, eating a communal meal, or doing one of Sally’s stupid “group bonding exercises”, there was always booze. Lots and lots of booze. In the words of a very drunk Frenchie, “There ain't no party like a Kit Kat Klub party, because at at Kit Kat Klub party you’ll probably get shitfaced and make out with your coworker.”

But tonight she was 100% almost completely sober. Her sobriety had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that Rosie was staying the night and she didn’t want to make a fool of herself. Nope, that would be ridiculous. Lulu shifts in their shared bed, leaning on her side to look at her girlfriend’s sleeping face. Her hair fell in soft curls, like a halo, framing her face against the blue bed sheets. The soft glow of a city at night and the slight whirring cars ambling on their way in the distance calms Lulu, as if she’s been transported into a distant reality. One with no bills, no worries, no Klub, just Rosie and Lulu and the moon above.

The tranquility of the moment is broken when Rosie lets loose a giant snore, her nostrils flaring. Lulu lets out a bark of laughter, cutting off quickly as to not wake her lover. This proved to be futile, since her phone chose that very moment to go off. The cackling laughter of Rupaul Charles fills the empty air, and Lulu almost falls out of bed. The ringtone had been a joke between her and Hans, but it seemed significantly less funny at - she glances at the clock - 2:58 in the god-be-damned morning. Shit, when had it gotten so late? Or at this point, did it qualify as early? She doesn’t know, time is weird. She sits up, laughter still dancing along the edges of her smile, rubbing her eyes at the sudden artificial brightness that floods out from her phone. 

“I swear to fucking god, if this is a prank call-” The all too sweet voice that answers doesn’t need to assure her that it isn’t. No one with a voice that held so much kindness constipation would be prank calling at 3am. Or ever, for that matter.

“Hi, this is the Emergency clinic, am I speaking to Mrs. Lulu Klein?” A icy hand snakes its way down Lulu’s throat, capturing her heart with a vice-like grip. 

“Yea. That’s me.” Her voice is leaden. She notices the comforters rustle with a detached curiosity, and turns to see Rosie propping herself up on one arm. Blinking in exhaustion, she raises one eyebrow. A question that Lulu does not know how to answer.

“You’re the emergency contact of a mister-” There's a clamor on the other side of the line. Someone is speaking frantically in low, frenzied words. Lulu feels her stomach drop. Goddammit, she know that voice. “He says you’ll recognize the name Em…?”

Working in this industry, with her friends, there was always a possibility for disaster. There was always the threat of mortality hanging above their heads as they danced on the teetering precipice that is life. But it never felt real, never felt imminent. Now as she thought of Em, laughing marvelous Em, dead or injured in the goddamned hospital it’s as if she can’t breathe.

“He’s alive-“ And Lulu is too relieved, to thankful to correct the nurse on the other side of the line. She goes on to talk of emergency contacts and somethings about contusions (what the fuck was a contusion?) and other fancy medical terms Lulu doesn’t understand, but Lulu’s heart is to busy beating a mile a minute for her brain to follow along. Rosie knows something’s wrong now, and she shifts to sit next to Lulu and take her free hand. 

“Who was it? What did they want?” Rosie prods the still vacant Lulu in the side, trying to shock her from her dumbstruck stupor. She slips her phone into her pocket, face grim.

“I’ve gotta go pick Em up.” Lulu stands, rustling through the heap of clothes beside the laundry basket for something semi-clean. Rosie snorts, flopping back down on their bed with a huff.

“Did they get themself arrested again?” Lulu shakes her head. The girl’s dark haired friend had a penchant for saying the exact wrong thing at the exact wrong moment, which was highly unhelpful when cops were around. There had been this one time, at protest when-

Lulu’s phone buzzes again, interrupting her train of thought. 

#1 Twink: The nurse said she called you too

#1 Twink: I can pick you up in five?

It’s Viktor, of course it is. Lulu wants to laugh, because it's such a stupidly Em move to have put the two of them down as emergency contacts. Instead of laughing, she clutches Rosie’s hand and whispers a quick explanation, leaving her girlfriend with kiss upon her worried brow.

Viktor is outside, his shitty old Volkswagen sputtering and coughing in the half-grey light. Lulu slid into the passenger seat beside him, his grim face mirroring back her own worries. 

“I assume they didn't tell you anything particularly helpful.” Lulu asks, regretting the fact that she’d been too consumed in her thoughts to really hear anything the nurse had said. Viktor shrugs, his mouth twisting into a frown. They don’t say anything else as they drive to the hospital, the artificial brilliance of the city painting Viktor’s car with shadows. Lulu doesn’t remember most of the drive; only the fear devouring her heart and stealing her breath.

The hospital smells of antiseptic and Lulu hates it. She hates the perfect white walls, the nurse’s smiles that never quite reached their eyes, the clock whose ticking seems to fill the deserted waiting room. Viktor is talking to the nurse, but Lulu isn’t listening. She notices, somewhere in the back of her mind, that his shirt is on backwards. In a detached way, she finds it almost funny. The glassy eyes of some drag queen stares back at her from the shirt, and her stomach twists. She’s sure Em gave it to Viktor; it’s the exact kind of thing both of them nerded out over. 

With a deflated sort of sigh, Viktor collapses into the plastic seat beside Lulu. 

“The nurse is sending Em down. Apparently, we’re their ride.” He snorts, a forced smile spreading on his lips. A joke, one neither of the laugh at. Viktor’s leg taps on the floor, betraying his worry. 

The elevator dings, and out limps the Master of Ceremonies. They’re swating away a nurse, who looks as if he was offering a hand. Em sways slightly, their lips pressing against each other as they notices the two friends. They glance away, and Lulu takes the moment to let her eyes search them. 

They’re wearing a grey hoodie with the hospital’s logo on it, and one of their pant legs is torn. Their hands are shoved deep into their pockets, their face twisted into a perminate wince. One eye is marbled with smudged makeup and bruising, their cheeks show mascara tear tracks. Their hair, normally slicked back, is askew. And that’s only what she can see. Lulu doesn’t know what to do, what to think. 

And Em is silent.

Em is hardly ever silent. 

Viktor seems to find words before her, and they escape him like he’s been punched in the gut.  
“What hap-”  
“Don’t. Their lips barely seem to move, they’re still looking at the floor. Their voice cracks, hourse as if they’d been yelling. Em sounds so defeated, so tired, in a way Lulu has never heard them before. It scares her. “Just don’t.”

**Author's Note:**

> Be sure to come say hi on my tumblr, Pidge-the-cryptid!!


End file.
